Mind Your Head. "What Wise People Know."

• "A wise man will hear and increase in learning, and a man of understanding will acquire wise counsel." Prov. 1:5   

 In our second week on wisdom, work hard with your group to reinforce that "knowing things" isn't the point of life, but living is. Wisdom is a way of saying "we know what kind of life, in any given moment, we ought to live". Let us never forget that we can memorize all the original-language words for wisdom, preach compelling sermons and participate in an ancient philosophy discussion, all centers on what wisdom is and is not, and still be morons! If this doesn't do anything, it isn't anything.




Thaw

• How has "wisdom" and/or wise choice-making come up since last week?
• What did you learn?
• What old patterns tried to take over that are at odds with what you sense was real wisdom?
• What most stuck with you from our time together on Sunday morning?

Read

• "A wise man will hear and increase in learning, and a man of understanding will acquire wise counsel." Prov. 1:5   
• "The heart of the discerning acquires knowledge; the ears of the wise seek it out." Prov. 18:15
• "The way of a fool seems right to him, but a wise man listens to advice." Prov. 12:15 

• Thoughts?
• Are you surprised to find that the wise person is described as being a learner? Explain.

Leader note: The idea here is simple; fools and know-it-alls position themselves in a way that tries to communicate they already know. They already know the news. They already know about the best products. They already know the latest science and psychological and dietary scoop. They already know what's going on politically, who's involved and even why. You can't tell them anything. Their job, from their perspective is to tell YOU. Yet, it's the wise people in the scriptures who eagerly learn from everybody, comparing ideas, asking questions and follow up questions, and aren't letting their insecure hopes to be something special overtake their desire to know how reality actually works. Einstein was once quoted as having said "the difference between me and others is that when people find a needle in a haystack, they quit. After I find it, I keep looking through the haystack to see what else I can find."

• Were you raised in an environment that chiefly celebrated the power of knowing or the power of learning?
• How has thus affected how you interact with others and the information about reality today?
• Respond as a group to the first point in Sunday's message:

 "Wise people know when they don't know".

Read

• "The prudent see danger and take refuge, but the simple keep going and suffer for it." Prov. 27:12
• "All hard work brings a profit, but mere talk leads only to poverty." Prov. 14:23 

• Thoughts?
• How is Sunday at church, or even this LifeGroup a potentially dangerous environment when we consider that there's work to do outside the emotional experience of merely "agreeing".
• What do we learn about the role of wisdom when we see God sent the Christ to live among us rather than an updated set of rules?
• Respond as a group to the second point of the message: 

"Wise people know "should" won't get them there."

Read

• "Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight. Do not be wise in your own eyes..." Prov. 3:5-7

• Thoughts?
• Why would humility and wisdom go together like this?
• What kinds of things do we have difficulty entrusting to God, and what kinds of things are no-brainers? See if you can find a pattern.
• Respond as a group to the third point of the message: 

"Wise people know that trusting something you have control over to someone else is when trust gets real."

Apply

• There's no much that can be done about all this in the context of a group discussion. This must be enacted. How can this group help you this week in our continued journey toward being wise people?
• When this week can you, ahead of time, prepare yourself to acquire wisdom? Think about places, people, meetings that you'll be confronted with in the next several days. How can you plan now to be wise and glean wisdom from there?
• In what ways are you hoping discussing all this will be enough because to actually start making good decisions about a particular issue is far too difficult?

Prayer

• Consider ending in silent prayer, reflecting on the proverbs above, hoping to leave your time together slightly more open to God's wisdom (wherever you find it) than when you arrived.